US News & World Report Cesarean Article
Sunday, June 4, 2006 at 06:50PM http://www.usnews.com/usnews/health/articles/060612/12healy.htm
This is written by Bernadine Healy (with whom I was on television once in 1996 or so - CBS This Morning - she diagnosed my heart valve disorder from Phen-Fen) - a VERY conservative doctor who once headed the Red Cross until she was removed because of some controversy or other.
Anyway, as someone who doesn't typically feel like such a VBAC noisemaker, it seems this week I am a hollering banshee about a woman's right to VBAC and the slick false advertising of elective cesareans.
This article speaks about a woman's desire for no pain as a reason for a cesarean, too. How does she say it?
"Some women are sensitive to the less glamorous aspects of pushing to exhaustion as their husbands watch helplessly, or quite simply see no glory in the pain of it all. It was big news last year when singer Britney Spears reportedly opted for a C-section because she feared the agony of a vaginal birth."
Isn't that horrible?
I won't, but sometimes it feels like I want to just throw up my hands and say, "you win." It's exhausting, all this talking into the hurricane with only the choir hearing my voice. Does anyone else care like we do? Is anyone listening?
Weapons... use my weapons. I won't let you down, my mamas... I promise.
Reader Comments (4)
C-section to avoid the "pain of childbirth".
Aaaaarrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Vaginal delivery hurts. For a few hours. If you tear, maybe for a week or even a few weeks afterwards. Then it's over.
Major abdominal surgery FUCKING HURTS.
For a LONG TIME!
EVERY DAY!
FOR MONTHS ON END!!!!!
I would rather have torn from my crotch to my asshold than have been gutted to deliver my baby.
Why are people so stupid??????????
I'm the choir, sorry. I know exactly how you feel. I feel strongly about the danger of the obstetrical model of care, but even more strongly about the hurricane blindness that is the culture of circumcision in this country.
Childbirth should be pain free, but it's okay to slice off newborn genitals without anesthesia?
I just want to lay down and give up and hide. I'm so exhausted by all of this.
I KNOW!
I just don't get the logic at all.
What I find interesting, though, is how aligned so many of us are. Wouldn't you think we could make enough noise to be heard, all of us?
Hmmm... maybe we ARE being heard and that's why Dr. Amy feels so driven to defend her myopic belief in medicated sheeple births.
I think so.
Let's keep shouting!
Barb,
I keep meaning to say I love your voice since you've come back from that break in blogging. You seem to have unshackled yourself from that horrible limiting fear of causing offence and are just telling it as it is these days in all its festering ugliness, injustice, tragedy and potential beauty.
Keep it up; it's a wonderfully powerful voice.
Penny